Tag Challenge

One of my favorite holiday activities is checking out the 12 Tags of Christmas with a Feminine Twist 2012 on the Ellen Hutson blog. This year, I have been inspired by this tag done by Paula Cheney done on Dec 9 and shown below mine. She has great instructions that I most followed - with just a few substitutions here and there.

 I love Paula's use of Tim Holtz products; with lovely, soft colors - and a bit of sparkle. I don't have the wreath die (aren't you surprised), but substituted his snowman - one of my favorite holiday images. I also used the bird and holly mover and shaper dies and a circle die and substitued the snow embossing folder for the poinsettia.

 I really like Paula's use of Spun Sugar, but thought that broken china was a better choice for snow. The bird was colored in Victorian Velvet stain. I picked up the die cut for the JOY when I was in St Pete for a class at Whim So Doodle last weekend. I  am still waiting for my order of the platinum glitter so I used another gold glitter in it's place; it came out great. I love her directions for using the powder glue - I had it in my stash, but this was the first time I have liked the results. It is still not as permanent as I would like for glitter, but forthis tag it worked great on these small pieces of  greenery. I also like the way she used rolled glue dots to attach the narrow letters. I added a layer of Antique Linen Distress Stickles to the bird and the JOY. All pieces were distressed with Vintage Photo.

Journal Love

Anita, Elaine and I headed off to Whim So Doodle in St. Pete yesterday for a wonderful journal class with Stephanie Ackerman. She is so warm and friendly; we learned lots of techniques and her class is creative and stress-free. You can find her blog here. These are pictures that I took of our time being creatively messy.

Cyndi and Stephanie

My tags showing embellishment techniques that we learned. I am going to include them in my December Daily Journal instead of putting into an art journal.

 I love the cover of my altered book. I think I am going to gut the inside totally and just use the cover. I saw the directions on pinterest for altering books - I think I pinned it. I don't care for the inside appearance of an altered book. I would rather have a more flexible binding where I can add/shift and change out pages when I want.

 

Here is my December Daily journal page for this day showing some of the cool collage and embellishing  techniques that we did in class.

 I created an envelope this morning to store receipts and class notes - aren't you surprised to hear that I already typed up my class notes. I had to before I forgot how to interpret my scribbles.

The girls and I are heading off to MFT for another Road Trip next weekend to Mingle and Jingle!

MFTWSC99

It has been awhile since I have had time to play with the weekly sketch challenge. I made the first card using Thankful Leaves and then decided to use the same dp and ink up a new image: PI Angel for another card. She is stamped in memento on copic blending cs. The dp is MME: Lost and Found and called Portobello Road. Dies used on the card include MFT's tab, crochet border and snowflakes. SU cs is baja and gray. Rhinestones, dimensionsl, stickles, and a SU snowflake embossing folder. She is paper-pieced and colored in copics.

Her skin is E50, E00, E11, R20 and BV00. Her hair is E33, YR23 and E39. Her wings are layered and colored in  C1, C3 and BV00. A sakura stardust pen and aqua brush were used for some sparkle. Shoes are C1, C3 and BV25. Her dress is paper-pieced and shaded in C1, C3 and BG70. The ground is E50, E43 and 0. The background is BG70, C1 and 0. Her halo is a spica glitter pen: sand and gold.

Thankful

I am so thankful for life's many blessings. Family came together last weekend to celebrate my husband's 60th birthday; it was so wonderful to have family gather from near and far. Thanksgiving day was quiet and a small gathering of friends.

I spent today playing with my new air compressor. It came in a couple of weeks ago, but I haven't really done more than turn it on. I made the following cards:

The sympathy card is done with a masked oval window using V15, BG72 and G99. The SU image is stamped in Memento on SU whisper white cs. The image is layered on SU plum and then mounted on whisper white.

Happy Holidays uses SU artichoke ink on whisper white cs and stars my all-time favorite SU stamp set: Lovely as a Tree. I air brushed copics (Y21, Y28 and BG72) to create the sky. I used MFT's new die: Snow Drifts with an edging of Frosted Lace stickles and a retired SU greeting stamped in artichoke. The card front was spritzed with Perfect Pearls mist, layered on artichoke cs and mounted on whisper white.

I'm so Grateful from MFT's stamp/die set: Thankful Leaves is stamped with SU Suede ink on Vanilla cs and mounted on Crumb. A band of suede cs is embossed in an SU embossing folder. The leaves are cut from SU text paper using the MFT Fall Leaves die . They are air-brushed using E49, E35, R29, Y15 and YG97. They are mounted on the suede band along with SU crumb tulle and seam binding and a button.

The next card also used the MFT Fall Leaves stamp/die set. The layout is MFTWSC99. I air-brushed E49 and BG72 around a leaf die cut on the main image and also distressed the edges of each piece of paper. The script from Thankful Leaves is stamped in SU suede. The dp is from MME: Lost and Found called Portobello Road. The card front is layered on SU cs: suede and mounted on a card base of baja. SU crumb tulle and baja seam binding accent the image. Other MFT dies include a lace border and oval tab.

November Cult Challenge

This month's cult sketch challenge use Mojo Monday #259. I used MFT PI Birthday Girl. She is stamped on Copic x-press-it with Memento Black. The card base is SU: Marina Mist and the dp is MME-A Mother's Love. Dies used include: MFT flag, flouish and layered rose. A PTI doily and leaf are also used. Her dress is paperpieced and colored with copics. Dimensionals were used under the dress; I remembers to shade under the dress with W1 this time. Stickles and a pearl were used in the center of the rose.




Copics used for the skin were E50, E00, E11, R20 and BV00. Hair is  Y21, Y35 and E33. The balloon is BG72, BG75 and BG78. Her shoes, dress shadows and ground were W1, W3 and W5. The background is shaded with BG70 and 0.

I also used this sketch (in reverse this time) to make a Thank You card for Anita. She made me the most beautiful beaded doll. You can see her at the end of the beading page. This time I used MFT PI: Blowing Bubbles that just came in my last order. The dp is another from MME callled Bluebell. The cs is copic x-press-it and SU: Indigo and Starfruit. The dies used are MFT doily oval, nestie scallop oval and oval; a MFT flower and a MS border punch. Also used are dimensionals, Stickles (Scattered Straw-for the flower center) and a Sakura Stardust gel pen (blended with an aqua pen over the top of the bubbles). Her skirt is paperpieced and she is colored with copics.










I used  the same colors as above for her skin and hair and background . Her shirt is BG70, BG11 picking up a bit of BG72 and W1. W1 is also used for the ground and skirt shadow. The bubbles are BG70, BG10 and BV00. Her socks are W and 0.

Odds and Ends

Still crazy busy at school; I guess it's just going to be one of those years. I haven't colored in a while, but I did finish up some projects this weekend. Check out my Charm page for an update with the rest of the "Human" theme and the first of the "Patriotic" Theme. I finished my Patriotic charms yesterday;  now I need to get the packaging done. It's our last swap. I have really enjoyed doing this swap, but am glad to take a break. I think that 6 is my limit for members of a charm swap; more is a chore.

We had our last Spirit Doll swap yesterday. I gave this doll to Elaine. Check out the bottom of my Beading page to view all of these treasures. I can't believe the work Anita did for my baby!

What is going to be our next challenge swap? Let's schedule it for January, please; I have Christmas to plan.

I have been spending a bunch of time on Pinterest; check out my boards: http://pinterest.com/celliott53/

Charlotte really wanted to be a part of our swap - actually, she wanted the yummy carrot cookies that Anita made.

 

Cult Challenge and Birthday Celebrations

Jan chose the sketch this month: SCCSC134 and I thought it was only fitting that I use the sketch to make her birthday card - with flamingos of course. The image is from Custer's Last Stamp: Flamingo Standing Tall CR1058-L. The dp is MME: Nolstalgia. The cs is copic x-press-it with black Memento. SU cs is also used: blush and pool. Pearls are used for embellishments as are retired SU shell stamps. MFT dies were used: fish tail flags and mini doilies. I think the flamingo die is from

Copics are used to color the images: Y21 and Y26. R20, R22 and R14. E30, E33 and 0 for the ground. The background dots are BG11, G00, Y21, E50 and R00. The "dot" background technique is one that I learned at my copic certification class. I am not sure if I like it better than the one that I normally use.

We celebrated both Jan and Joyce's birthdays tonight with cake and more raspberry slushes. I hope they like their presents - I made them each a "December Daily Smash Book." I really enjoyed writing in mine last year and have been planning these presents for a while; my first plan was to make these over the summer-needless to say- I operated on plan B: get them done by their birthdays. I used 31 printed, one-sided pieces of cardstock. On the white side, I spritzed with perfect pearl mists; stamped and embossed the date, and decorated with a strip of dp. Jan's is in blue and silver and Joyce received the earth tones. I included a variety (sizes, colors, papers, designs) of embossed envelopes and decorated a number of tags. I also included a folder of embellishments - many are die cuts along with some stamped and colored images - for them to use to personalize their pages. I had so much fun making their "card candy." I have included a slide show of some pages from their books.